Worrying and trying out dictation app for iPhone

I'm really nervous about stopping working. I've never not worked even when I was in college I always worked. I'm worried about Brandon I'm worried about the stress of him being the sole breadwinner of the family.

I'm worried that we won't be able to handle everything with just one income not because we can't afford to, but because we are used to a certain standard of living and I know that we're going to have to make a lot of cutbacks and sacrifices in order for me to do what I'm about to do so that I can finish school year and a half sooner. I really love my hubby and I really don't want a kill him with stress and anxiety.

I'm also worried about my time management. It's really important to me that this decision be a good decision that it be good for myself and my family and that it provide me with more efficient time is not less efficient time use more motivation not less motivation. once I stop working and I'm just going to school I'll have a lot more time but I'm worried i won't be able to use it as efficiently.

By the way this blog post was blogged using the dragon dictation system on my iPhone. It allows me to speak my blogs and speak my words rather than trying to type on a very very tiny keyboard.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Making a go...

I'm going to try not wking for a while. It'll let me fin sch a yr sooner& lower the stress lvl. I'm also getting use to typing on my iPhone & trying out this new blogging app. So far I like it a lot. I can definitely see myself getting addicted to this! Lol! My last day of wk is next fri as of now. More to come when I get home to my nice big keyboard!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Soundtrack: Building a Mystery

Song: Building a Mystery by Sarah McLachlan
Anime: Vampire Hunter D

Made: Not by me LOL!

Tai Chi

I'm really enjoying my Tai Chi classes. I can only go once a month or so b/c I have to pay for them as a private lesson b/c there aren't enough ppl interested for the instructor to form a class. But, I've been practicing at home too. I'm trying to go through the forms/exercises at least three times a day. I like the fact that my instructor keeps the martial aspect of the art and explains where the movements can be strikes/throws/etc. At the same time, the slow pace and the soft rhythm of the movements is so calming (although the physical side sneaks up on you...you think you feel fine/that it's not hurting and then out of nowhere ... BAM!) I've been taking Tai Chi b/c I hurt my arm a couple of weeks ago. I found a lump on it, and the doctor said I strained it (or that it might be a lipoma). I have to take it easy for another week to see if it goes away. If it doesn't I'm suppose to go back to the doc. So, for another week I can't do high impact stuff like Wing Chun.

If I could, I'd focus all my weekly classes on Tai Chi. It originally started out in Buddhist tradition which is ironic considering I just recently started checking out Buddhist meditation.

Life, the Universe, and Everything...

"He had noticed that events were cowards: they didn't occur singly, but instead they would run in packs and leap out at him all at once.” ~ Neil Gaiman

Right now I have a very VERY needy tabby curled up on my lap that is trying to make blogging as difficult as possible. And it seems he only wants loving when I pick up my computer. Evil cat.

Sometimes it's good to take a mental check. A moment to gather one's thoughts and reassess momentum. I'm trying to finish graduate school. Much of what I want for myself, my husband, and my family hinges on completing it quickly. Yet, I also know that finishing school never makes things "easier." If anything it only adds more complication and responsibility. (And don't we all just want to be Peter Pan and never grow up?) Right now I'm trying to take pleasure in the small things and attempt to "slow down" as much as possible. Meditation is helping a lot with that as is Martial Arts. I haven't been able to work out as much as I would like the past few weeks. Between Amanda dying, school approaching finals, work stress, etc...I feel lucky to have had time to sleep and do the dishes. Then to top it all off, I hurt my arm, further frustrating my workout:P

I lost 5lbs though since I started! (yippy!) I have to keep going and get back into shape. (I think I can! I think I can!) :D

Brandon is stressing out more and more with the oil spill in the gulf. Louisiana's economy depends on oil. (Say a prayer for us and all families that work in the oil field in the South right now.)

Currently Reading: Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman (it's my favorite book and I'm re-reading it) and the manga Vampire Knight.

Ouchies...

I have a weird lump on my elbow that's a little bigger than a quarter but smaller than a golf ball. It's been there since last Tues. but I didn't want to freak anyone out before I could get to a doctor. I went Monday. He said there's a fatty patch on the elbow and that underneath it, it's likely irritated/inflamed and that's causing it to "lump out" all gross like. At least it doesn't look like cancer. I'm on anti-inflammatory pills and ice packs. If it doesn't go away in two weeks I gotta go back b/c it could also be a lipoma (which is when the fatty cells grow on their own in a benign way). It makes my fingers tingle. Ewwy!
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soundtrack: boom ba

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Just finished watching Heath Leger's last film. I love when Johnny Depp says: "Nothing is permanent, not even death." In many ways I felt like all the characters in the film were acting out of their own selfish interests. The morality and the hang man. Death and life, inevitability.

The really interesting part was the struggle surrounding individual choices as the lines began to blur. How do you know which "choice" is the right one? Heaven and Hell are rarely so well defined as clearly written lettering on a door. It reminded me of I <3 Huckabees. It's a movie that would go well with late night delirium coupled with amateur philosophizing. LOL! :D

Meditation - Compassion

I went to meditation today. The practice on Sundays centers on visualizing negative energy being drawn into the person meditating and radiating out love and compassion. Tonglen - giving and receiving. As I meditated, the negative and the positive seemed almost the same to me. It's hard to phrase how I felt during the practice. I felt the euphoria and the goodness that lightheaded feeling that comes as everything goes calm. Yet, I know that there is more to meditation than feeling good. Emotion is subjective. I can feel bad, good, pain, joy, but in the end it is not the goal. The goal is to get closer to the stillness beyond those things. Because both the positive and the negative are both maras in themselves, it seems to me that giving and receiving itself is a mara. It is all one and the same. In the quiet, their are different expressions or forms that the maras take...from there they anchor a person in place. According to the meditation, maras are illusions.

I want to get closer to the stillness. I've prayed in charismatic Catholic youth groups and felt the emotional build up that comes with it. In adoration, there is a stillness that mirrors the Buddhist meditation; however, there is also this idea of petitioning. From what I have seen so far, Buddhist meditation is about compassion and acceptance. To accept myself and the events around me in all their darkness and light and try be still within them.

Protege Moi

I'm hoping to make meditation tomorrow. Thurs, I realized I was content with where I was during the meditation...and that kind of made me realize I needed to push myself a bit more...

Contentment is good, but it can keep you from progressing. I want to understand as much as I can.


(This Video is from the Movie Mirror Mask by Neil Gaiman. The Song is by Placebo. I didn't make it...but it sums up my mood sometimes.)
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On another note, I found a small lump on my arm. I'm going to the doctor Mon. to have them look at it. Hopefully it's nothing. But, I am stressing out a good bit.

The Karate Kid...Re-mixed

I went with Brandon after work to see the new Jackie Chan movie. Jayden Smith was surprisingly good (he has a LOT of Will Smith's mannerisms which is REALLY funny to watch)! The plot was the exact same theme as the original, but redone. There were a lot of tribute moments for fans of the original. "Strike hard, Strike fast, No Mercy Sir!" -- the Cobra theme from the original was funny to watch in Chinese with English subtitle! The martial arts was better in this version than in the original. (BEAUTIFUL CHOREOGRAPHY!!!)

I will always love the original, and Mr. Meagi is irreplaceable. But, Jackie Chan/the movie is successful because he does not try to be the original. (He doesn't even have the same name etc.) Rather, it builds off what was a successful story idea, makes it its own, and pays tribute to the original in little touches.

New Design feature on Blogger

I was just playing around with blogger's new design section. I like it a lot. I had customized my blog before using html copy and pasted from another site and a template I'd downloaded. But the new design feature was a whole lot easier (and no html knowledge is needed now). It took me all of a couple hours to redesign my site. And it would have gone a lot quicker, but I was indecisive about the background/header image etc. :D Very cool stuff!

Favoritest Eric Moment of all time! :D

This is the scene when Eric trick's Sookie into drinking his blood! Favorite line? ..."I'm dying ...ehhh..." ROFLMAO!

a bottle of red...and true blood :P

I'm a lil tipsy right now...not to the point of intoxication but pleasantly fuzzy. I'm watching the second season of True Blood and drooling over Eric Northman. Tomorrow I have to finish my ethics papers. (I worked on personality theory today.)

I found out I can graduate a whole year early if I take 3 courses at a time instead of 2. Right now I'm not struggling with 2, but I am severely stressing. I'm thinking I'll try it out next semester and see what I think...ack...seems like I never stop thinking.

Toying with ideas...

I'm debating an idea for a new tattoo. I really want a quote/bookish one (preferably referencing a work by Neil Gaiman -- He is the author that really made me LOVE books). I want it in a place that's easily covered but can also be showed off on occasion without me having to be scantily clothed. I'm debating between this or a prayer bead anklet for my next one (to symbolize the importance of spirituality in my life)....hmmm...

Here's a picture of a Neil Gaiman image from Coraline that speaks to me. I like the keyhole aspect and I like the quote....but Coraline isn't my favorite of his works. I really like his book Neverwhere and his comic series Sandman, and am debating putting a different quote in the same general spot in the keyhole.

The following are some quotes I like from various Neil Gaiman works...not all would fit in the keyhole, but I haven't really finished working it out or where I'd put it:

"Face your life
Its pain, its pleasure
Leave no path untaken"

"Beware of Doors." (this is one that I'm thinking of replacing in the keyhole from Neverwhere)

"He had gone beyond the world of metaphor & simile into the place of things that are, and it was changing him."

"He had noticed that events were cowards: they didn't occur singly, but instead they would run in packs and leap out at him all at once.”

“But he did not understand the price. Mortals never do. They only see the prize. Their hearts desire, their dream....But the price of getting what you want is getting what you once wanted.”

“We all not only could know everything. We do. We just tell ourselves we don't to make it all bearable.”

"Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and adventures are the shadow truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes and forgotten”

“This is a work of fiction. All the characters in it, human and otherwise, are imaginary, excepting only certain of the fairy folk, whom it might be unwise to offend by casting doubts on their existence. Or lack thereof.”

“It was a dark and stormy nightmare”

“I lost some time once. It's always in the last place you look for it.”

“Charitably...I think...Sometimes perhaps one must change or die. And in the end, there were perhaps limits to how much he could let himself change.”